Signal acquisition devices such as digital storage oscilloscopes (DSOs) use a display grid that is fixed at eight divisions vertically by ten divisions horizontally. The eight by ten division grid is the same size as the grids initially etched into the glass of the cathode ray tube (CRT) such as provided by the earlier analog oscilloscopes. The eight by ten division grid has lingered despite the fact that most engineering applications requiring the graphing of data are not limited to an eight by ten graticule. That is, in virtually all disciplines of science, data is typically graphed with scales that provide an appearance adapted for ease of interpreting the data. One disadvantage of the current standard oscilloscope approach is that as data is zoomed on the display, the graticules are still fixed as eight by ten rather than providing a constant frame of reference to the acquired waveform parameters.